AP awaits Congress verdict for Telangana!

HYDERABAD: With the completion of five state assembly elections, Andhra Pradesh is keenly waiting for Congress’ call on the vexatious state bifurcation issue.

For years the Congress has dodged the issue fearing a political backlash. But its indecisiveness on either creating a Telangana state or keeping Andhra Pradesh united has only been aggravating the unrest among people of the two regions.

To say that the entire state has been pushed into turmoil ? on all fronts ? particularly since December 2009 on account of the Congress’ dithering stand will only be an understatement.

The distress caused to ordinary people, the beating that the state’s image had taken notably on the investment front, the internal rift that the main political parties of the state were left with and the enormous loss caused to the state exchequer on account of the strife are now part of history.

But, history threatens to repeat if the Congress drags its feet.

The Congress-led UPA government at the Centre has bought time, from the aggressive statehood proponents, till completion of polls to five state assemblies even as close to five months elapsed since the five-member Justice Srikrishna Committee submitted its recommendations on the contentious subject.

Now that elections are over, the separatists are ready to up the ante once again and go all out in their quest for the state of Telangana that so far remained elusive for them.

Not only the separatists but also the integrationists are seeking an immediate solution to the crisis.

"From June 1, we will put Telangana on the boil and even take our struggle to the international level," declared the separatist leader K Chandrasekhar Rao, whose Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) has been in the forefront of the statehood struggle.(PTI)